Help Please in a panic!

SLH_2

Hello,

Hope you can help. I bought a small terraced house a couple of months ago and having a little bit of a panic!

There are wooden beams downstairs and I have noticed on the ceiling that the plaster has started coming away from them a little.

The house is around 140 years old and has had subsidence in the past, in the survey it said “General movement was noted to the property. The movement is consider to be longstanding in nature and the risk of further movement taking place is acceptable”
Any experts out there, do you think that this could be signs of subsidence or the plaster shrinking due to the hot and cold weather latterly? The house was decorated before I moved it but I believe was empty since around April 2009.
I have checked round the bottom of the vertical walls and can not see any cracks.
Thanks in advance for your help
Sarah

keystone

All properties move! Your survey is quite clear and it seems not to be a cause for alarm. However, it might be prudent to give the guy a ring that did the survey (it was only a few months ago after all) and ask him to pop in and have another look. I think its important that you get the same surveyor back again for commonality in that case.

Cheers

Plasterer

Hi Sarah,

The plaster will not be "shrinking" this doesn't happen after a long time. More likely is the following.
Your house is 140 years old so I am assuming your ceilings will be Lath and plaster. The laths are pieces of thin cut timers running approx 10 mm apart and fixed to joists this then is plastered on an angle to push the plaster through the wood and form a curl on the other side for a "Key".
As you say you have subsidence , I think what is likely to be happenning is that the Laths are twisting with movrmrnt of joists and therefore cracking the "curl" on the back therefore destroying the "key" which in turn lets the plaster come away from the Lath. This type of plaster work would have been done originally with lime - Lime can withstand slight movement and has self healing properties but not to an extent of severe movement.

If you want to check the extent of the movement within your house, put a pencil mark at the end of a crack on the plaster and study it over the coming months. Obviously if it is still cracking you will be able to see by how much over how ever long.
Would probably advise getting it surveyed again though for piece of mind
Hope this helps.
P